Customer Reviews

German Artillery in World War II 1939-1945: (Schiffer Military History)

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Any review of this book would have to start out with stating that this book is photo survey of German Artillery. Nowhere in the Amazon site or the front or back flaps of this book would one even get this idea. If anything, the potential reader would be lead to believe, by both the Amazon site for this book and the descriptions provided on the front and back flaps of the book that this book is a general non-photo survey of German Artillery.

How does the book succeed in serving as a general photo survey of German Artillery? Quite well. There are photographs of every type of artillery used by the Germans during the Second World War. This not only includes photos of commonly used artillery such as 105 and 150 mm guns and Nebelwerfers but also less commonly used artillery such as rail guns and V-2 rockets. The photo coverage of these includes shots of these weapons in limbered positions, unlimbered, in action and being transported. There are also photographs of all the major self-propelled platforms such as the commonly used Wespe and Hummel as well as the rare Brumbar. It should be stressed, however, that the photographs do not provide very detailed coverage of each weapon (i.e., the type that would be most useful to modelers or diorama builders). There is not coverage of each weapon in this book that is analogous to specialist books covering each of these weapons (or classes of weapons) on a standalone basis (i.e., such as the Squadron series for example). Then again, this book is only intended as a general photo survey and in that it succeeds.

The book also includes photos of the main vehicles used as carriers of these weapons, especially horses. Photos are also included of forward artillery spotters and various other activities that were ancillary but absolutely essential to the artillery branch (i.e., laying of telephone wire, setting up wireless commutation posts, etc.).
The book however and very unfortunately provides no analysis whatsoever of this service. There is, outside of photo captions, almost no narrative. Hence the reader learns nothing of doctrine, training, weapons development, etc. There are a few tables on artillery and shell production and losses that give the reader an idea of quantities but this does not make up for lack of any analysis.

In short, if the reader is interested in a general photographic survey of German artillery and ancillary vehicles and activities, this is the book is excellent. If, however, the reader is interested in any type of analysis this is not the book to purchase.

This is essentially a photo book on WWII German Artillery. It has a few tables and near incomprehensible diagrams (some in German) but its core are the photographs.
These include various aspects of field artillery (light, medium and heavy, horsedrawn and towed) and siege mortars (about 90 pages), railroad guns (8 pages), self-propelled artillery (35 pages), coastal artillery (5 pages) and long range rockets (3 pages). This subject dispersion detracts from the overall value of the book. The less covered subjects would better be omitted because much better works are available to the interested reader.

The relevant photos are interesting and depict many less well known aspects of artillery fare. Captions are brief but useful. Unfortunately most photo's quality is quite poor and the subject, let alone details, are often hardly discernible. All seem to have been greyed out somehow - and this is not a characteristic of German photos of the time, compare for instance `German Flak in World War II: (Schiffer Military/Aviation History)' by Werner Muller, where you can see crisp contemporary photos.

In the end this book may be of interest to readers not having other sources on German WWII field artillery (its only chapter of some use) or finding it at a low price. Others better search for alternatives.